Through the Magic of Telephone Technology, I Participate in the Smash Family Reunion

Jennie Smash: Does it bother you that I’ve bleached everything in my apartment three times?

Mrs. Piddington: Well, once probably would have been enough.

Jennie Smash: There was a roach, though.

Mrs. Piddington: I read about the roach. (Muttering in the background.) What was that, sweetie? Oh, John says that he likes roaches.

Jennie Smash: John’s stinky. Guess what else?

Mrs. Piddington: What?

Jennie Smash: I went to the doctor today and my bilirubin levels are great.

Mrs. Piddington: What’s that?

Jennie Smash: Ask Mom.

Mrs. Piddington: Hey, Mom, Jen’s bilirubin levels are great.

Ma Smash: (In the background.) Well, I’ll be damned.

Mrs. Piddington: What are they?

Ma Smash:(In the background.) Liver functions. Ask her if the bartender told her that.

Mrs. Piddington: Mom wants to know if the bartender told you that.

Jennie Smash: Tell Mom she’s sort of an ass. Also, tell her my groceries are going to magically appear in about two minutes, like magic.

Mrs. Piddington: Mom, you’re an ass. And Jennie’s getting groceries from the grocery delivery man. (Muttering in the background.) John says you’re going to have an affair with the grocery delivery man.

Jennie Smash: John’s going to have an affair with the grocery delivery man.

Mrs. Piddington: He is not!

Jennie Smash: No, he’s not. Guess what else?

Mrs. Piddington: What?

Jennie Smash: I got a million shots today from a 12-year-old nurse.

Mrs. Piddington: My nurse was 12 the last time I went in for a checkup. What shots did you get?

Oh yes, and by the way, Mr. Piddlington was disappointed that his grossest and most annoying comments didn’t make it into this post. He claims he said much worse things during that conversation than you gave him credit for. Oh yeah, and he also says you’re stinky, and that you must not love him because you never come to visit. And that if you come to visit, we’ll buy the beer. I told him how expensive that might end up being for us, but he didn’t seem to mind.

Somehow I think if you developed muscle wasting you wouldn’t need a pamphlet to tell you it was a bad thing.

But you know doctors have a lot more of those types of pamphlets, though, and you should ask for a handful of random ones the next time you visit. Put them in the bathroom so you have something to do in there.

I like to get the ones about drug problems and alcohol abuse and then leave them around my friends’ homes like I’m staging an intervention.

No no no, Jayman! You are not helping! We do not encourage Jennie Smash to be MORE hypochondriacal, no matter how funny it is. And it is funny. But one of these days her head is gonna explode, and I’m rather fond of that head. I have this image of her sitting on the side of the tub in her bathroom, pamphlets scattered about her while she rocks back and forth, clutching various parts of her body that she believes to be rotting off. No good.